The director of an Israeli research and analysis organization
that examines Palestinian newspapers, television and schoolbooks believes that
the Palestinians are not laying the groundwork for peace with Israel, but are in
fact doing the opposite. Itamar Marcus, director of
Palestinian Media Watch (PMW),
cited examples from Palestinian leaders and media that show the Palestinians
continue to reject Israel’s right to exist, continue to demonize Israel and
continue to glorify terrorism. Speaking with Bridges for Peace, Marcus said that
even the so-called moderate Palestinian Authority (PA) leadership is failing to
prepare their people for peace.

Said Marcus of Palestinian demonization of Israel, “All of
this, coming from so many different directions and so many different ways, makes
us conclude that Israel does not yet have a peace partner.”

As one example also posted on the PMW Web site in late
August, Marcus pointed to a children’s PA TV program in which a moderator asks a
little girl what occupied cities she has visited. When the child lists Hebron,
which is in the West Bank [Judea and Samaria], the PA TV moderator corrects the
child and notes that city is liberated. The moderator then lists as occupied
cities several Israeli cities such as Jaffa, Tel Aviv’s sister city, and Haifa,
a northern coastal city that is one of Israel’s largest cities.

Marcus points out that such a position is being presented by
PA TV, which is controlled by the office of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.
“[Abbas] is supposed to be the most moderate, who we’re supposed to be able to
reach an agreement with,” he said.

Marcus also noted that the Palestinians are telling their
people they will not compromise on the so-called core issues, such as Jerusalem,
refugees and borders. “What their tactic has always been is to have demands that
Israel can’t reach and can’t agree to, because they’re unacceptable for many
different reasons, and then they go back to violence and get the world to try to
put more pressure on Israel,” said Marcus.

“And I think that’s the stage we’re getting into now, it’s
really an attempt to give lip-service to the peace process and then eventually
go back to violence, blaming it on Israel in front of the world.”

Marcus also noted that Israel is being libeled and demonized
by the Palestinians as spreading AIDS, cancer and drugs. “If the Palestinian
Authority wants to prepare their people for peace, they would not be having
people like their ministers saying that Israel is poisoning its own people and
then spreading drugs, etc.”

Furthermore, though Abbas issued a condemnation of the recent
Hamas terror shooting attack that killed four Israelis, Marcus said that in a
recent op-ed to the Jerusalem Post, Palestinian Media Watch wrote that the
Palestinians’ condemned the violence “because the timing was wrong.” Marcus said
that even Prime Minister Salaam Fayyad, portrayed by the West as one of the best
examples of a moderate Palestinian leader, critiqued the timing of the shooting.

Abbas, it should be noted, has repeatedly argued against
violence as being contrary to the Palestinians’ interest. However, Marcus said
the Palestinian leader has also sent the Minister of Prisoners on a recent visit
to the mother of four children in jail for multiple murders. The mother was also
given an award. Furthermore, Marcus noted the Palestinian glorification of
terrorists, including naming a summer camp after a female terrorist involved in
murdering 37 civilians.

“They go to Washington, they have a completely different
face, they pretend like they’re going through the [peace] process,” said Marcus.
“I tend, after years of experience, not to trust what they say in English unless
the same message is coming through in Arabic. And when they contradict, I will
believe the Arabic…I think that’s the message that the world should accept as
the true message, because that’s the one that they’re telling their own people.”
†

My current position on the sequence of prophetic
fulfillment given the current conditions is that the push for peace will not
lead to the dividing of Israel that I believe scripture foretells. Rather I
believe that a false premise of peace will be played with leading to several
other prophetic events. Ultimately I believe that a Palestinian state will
be created, but not until several other events take place first.

Psalm 83:1-8
Keep not thou silence, O God: hold not thy peace, and be not still, O
God. For, lo, thine enemies make a tumult: and they that hate thee have
lifted up the head. They have taken crafty counsel against thy people,
and consulted against thy hidden ones. They have said, Come, and let us
cut them off from being a nation; that the name of Israel may be no more
in remembrance. For they have consulted together with one consent: they
are confederate against thee: The tabernacles of Edom, and the
Ishmaelites; of Moab, and the Hagarenes; Gebal, and Ammon, and Amalek;
the Philistines with the inhabitants of Tyre; Assur also is joined with
them: they have holpen the children of Lot. Selah.

The article
Psalm 83 … Preview Of A Coming Attraction,
covers the basics of this passage. Ultimately we are seeing the surrounding
Islamic terrorist groups actively antagonizing the peace process and as
stated in the article above, there are clearly some differing voices within
the non-political community regarding the desire to strike a deal with
Israel. The connections seen with the arms being given to these antagonist
groups through Syria from Iran and Russia, leads to the second phase.

Isaiah 17:1-3; 9
The burden of Damascus. Behold, Damascus is taken away from being a
city, and it shall be a ruinous heap. The cities of Aroer are forsaken:
they shall be for flocks, which shall lie down, and none shall make them
afraid. The fortress also shall cease from Ephraim, and the kingdom from
Damascus, and the remnant of Syria: they shall be as the glory of the
children of Israel, saith the LORD of hosts. In that day shall his
strong cities be as a forsaken bough, and an uppermost branch, which
they left because of the children of Israel: and there shall be
desolation.

After the failed attacks against Israel with the
recognition that Damascus is both a terrorist center and responsible for the
buildup of weapons used, could Israel finally say enough is enough?
Israel has threatened before to attack Damascus based on the actions of
Hizbullah and others. An attack by Israel in the current climate that would
lead to the destruction of Damascus would not go unanswered however.

Ezekiel 38:3-8; 18-23
And say, Thus saith the Lord GOD; Behold, I am against thee, O Gog, the
chief prince of Meshech and Tubal: And I will turn thee back, and put
hooks into thy jaws, and I will bring thee forth, and all thine army,
horses and horsemen, all of them clothed with all sorts of armour, even
a great company with bucklers and shields, all of them handling swords:
Persia, Ethiopia, and Libya with them; all of them with shield and
helmet: Gomer, and all his bands; the house of Togarmah of the north
quarters, and all his bands: and many people with thee. Be thou
prepared, and prepare for thyself, thou, and all thy company that are
assembled unto thee, and be thou a guard unto them. After many days thou
shalt be visited: in the latter years thou shalt come into the land that
is brought back from the sword, and is gathered out of many people,
against the mountains of Israel, which have been always waste: but it is
brought forth out of the nations, and they shall dwell safely all of
them... And it shall come to pass at the same time when Gog shall come
against the land of Israel, saith the Lord GOD, that my fury shall come
up in my face. For in my jealousy and in the fire of my wrath have I
spoken, Surely in that day there shall be a great shaking in the land of
Israel; So that the fishes of the sea, and the fowls of the heaven, and
the beasts of the field, and all creeping things that creep upon the
earth, and all the men that are upon the face of the earth, shall shake
at my presence, and the mountains shall be thrown down, and the steep
places shall fall, and every wall shall fall to the ground. And I will
call for a sword against him throughout all my mountains, saith the Lord
GOD: every man’s sword shall be against his brother. And I will plead
against him with pestilence and with blood; and I will rain upon him,
and upon his bands, and upon the many people that are with him, an
overflowing rain, and great hailstones, fire, and brimstone. Thus will I
magnify myself, and sanctify myself; and I will be known in the eyes of
many nations, and they shall know that I am the LORD.

This passage speaks of the alliance of Iran, Turkey,
Libya, Ethiopia and likely Russia brought with hooks in the jaws against
Israel from the mountains of the North, where they are destroyed by God with
fire and brimstone. I believe the hooks in the jaws may point to the growing
alliances between those prophesied to attack Israel and
Syria.

Dividing Israel for peace

Try and imagine the political environment after the Psalm
83 alliance fails to get rid of Israel, Damascus is destroyed and the
resulting attack on Israel is thwarted and the armies are destroyed. I have
a feeling that the environment will see less backpedaling by the
Palestinians and a greater desire to compromise. However I don’t believe
that many of the settlers in Israel will see the compromise and dividing of
Israel in a positive light.

Zechariah 14:1,2
Behold, the day of the LORD cometh, and thy spoil shall be divided in
the midst of thee. For I will gather all nations against Jerusalem to
battle; and the city shall be taken, and the houses rifled, and the
women ravished; and half of the city shall go forth into captivity, and
the residue of the people shall not be cut off from the city.